German National Evaluation Programme for Plant Genetic Resources (EVA II) Sarah Sensen Federal Office for Agriculture and Food (Germany, Bonn) Information and Coordination Centre for Biological Diversity

Overview →Development of EVA II →Organisational structure →Workflow →Composition and management of the testing collection →Information system →Strength of EVA II →Awareness raising →Ideas for a global evaluation network

Development of EVA II →Situation before EVA II: Huge amounts of genebank (observation) and other evaluation data were collected for various crops, but data from different sources, test- conditions or different years cannot be compared (random and fragmented scores, no standard lines, etc.) →Objectives of EVA II: Establishment of a network for the evaluation of PGR for wheat and barley Improvement of secundary evaluation on disease resistances with coordinated and collective evaluation with the same methods and same standards Development of a dynamic information system for data acquisition and assessment

Organisational structure of EVA II Expert group Representatives of breeding companies Association for Promotion of Private Plant Breeding (GFP) scientific partner (JKI and others)) Federal Office for Agriculture and Food (BLE) Meeting 1-2 x per annuum Decision on traits and composition of the testing collection Julius Kuehn Institute Institute for Resistance Research and Stress Tolerance (coordinator) Association for the Promotion of Private Plant Breeding e.V. Partner Private Plant Breeders (companies) Cooperation partner Federal Office for Agriculture and Food Privileged guest

Partner in the cooperation treaty →Breeding companies 1.Pflanzenzucht SaKa GmbH & Co. KG 2.KWS-LOCHOW GmbH 3.Saaten Union GmbH 4.Limagrain GmbH 5.Dieckmann GmbH & Co. KG 6.SECOBRA Saatzucht GmbH 7.W. von Borries-Eckendorf GmbH & Co. KG 8.Lantmännen SW Seed Hadmersleben GmbH 9.RAGT 2N 10.Nordsaat Saatzuchtgesellschaft mbH 11.Deutsche Saatveredelung AG 12.Saatzucht Josef Breun GmbH & Co. KG 13.Saatzucht Streng-Engelen GmbH & Co. KG 14.Pflanzenzucht Oberlimpurg Dr. Franck 15.Saatzucht Bauer GmbH & Co. KG 16.Syngenta Seeds GmbH →Scientific institutions 1.Julius Kühn-Institut, Quedlinburg (Koordinator) 2.Landesanstalt für Landwirtschaft, Institut für Pflanzenbau und Pflanzenzüchtung, Freising 3.Landwirtschaftliche Lehranstalten Triesdorf 4.Universität Hohenheim, Landessaatzuchtanstalt

Workflow in EVA II 1.Supply of seeds of interesting genotypes (selected by the expert group) 2.Multiplication and primary evaluation of the genotypes (coordinator) 3.Package of the testing collections and sending to the partners, preparation of the evaluation lists within the database (coordinator) 4.Cultivation of the testing collections in small- scale parcels and evaluation of the disease infection (partners) 5.Documentation of results in excel lists and upload of the lists (partners) 6.Import in the database and release of the results for consortium partners only (coordinator)

Management of the assortments →Bonitur lists (in Excel) are provided online and can later be imported automatically online. →Import of the genotype data in the multi crop passport descriptor format (FAO & EURISCO)

Sources of seeds →Genebank material (primary evaluation) Search in databases (e.g. GRIN) Publications Genebank collections (e.g. IPK, ICARDA, CIMMYT) →Varieties Proposals of the partners Publications →Material from research projects, e.g. New resistance genes Combination of different resistance genes

Composition of the testing collection → Number of genotypes / testing collection / year ~ 50 genotypes Total number of evaluated genotypes in EVA II (11/2013)

Focus for the testing collection YearWheatBarley 2005 Drechslera tritici-repentis (DTR); Septoria; Fusarium Physiological leaf spots 2007Leaf rustRhynchosporium 2009DTR (tan blotch)Barley yellow dwarf virus (BYDV) 2010Septoria; DTRLeaf rust; Rhynchosporium 2011Septoria; DTRLeaf rust; Rhynchosporium 2012Stripe rustBYDV; Rhynchosporium; net blotch

Information system →Serves for the acquisition, analyses, provision of evaluation data →Serves for the information flow of the cooperation partner →The acquired results are shared among the consortium partners for direct use in their respective breeding programs. →After 3 years, the data become freely accessible (public domain). →Partners can search the results by year, crop, disease or location

Database – search opportunities

Database – results

Outlook: Dataflow of German C&E data into other databases Data in EVA II Accessible for EVA partner German National Inventory for PGR (PGRDEU) The European Search Catalogue on PGR (EURISCO) Genesys Public domain Data format agreed in ECPGR Multi Crop Passport Descriptors

Strength of EVA II →Possibility to compare several years (standard reference lines) →Possibility to compare several locations (different agro-ecological sites, agreed sites) →Close collaboration of breeders to generate synergies; free exclusive access to all data in the first 3 years as an incentive (self-interest, no external funding)

Awareness raising for EVA II →ECPGR Task Force: User Engagement Summer 2013, Lorenzo Maggioni (Bioversity), Riccardo Bocci, Jan Nedelnik, Frank Ordon Proposal to extent the EVA II system to Europe in ECPGR Improvement of the cooperation between science, genebanks and users by evaluating genetic resources and broadening to more traits Stronger inclusion of farmers as stakeholders →EC Preparatory action for genetic resources Proposal to extent the EVA II system to Europe →FAO´s Global Partnership Initiative for Plant Breeding Capacity Building Presentation of EVA II

Ideas for a global evaluation network →Public-Private-Partnership on the value addition chain →CGIAR centre or the Advanced Research Institutions as possible coordinators of the network →Partner from developed and developing countries as well as big breeding institutions involved in the network →Advantage for all partner to get comparable evaluation results from diverse agro-ecological sites Source: IT/COGIS-1/15/Report

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